


Deep Cover

by A Crimson Phoenix (cw151)



Series: The Winters Universe [6]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Babyfic, F/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-01
Updated: 2016-01-01
Packaged: 2018-05-10 23:03:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5604277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cw151/pseuds/A%20Crimson%20Phoenix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Natasha comes to terms with not giving her daughter away.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Deep Cover

Natasha closed the bathroom door behind her and turned on the shower. Instead of undressing and stepping into it, however, she leant on to the bathroom sink with stretched arms and dropped her head. 

Slowly, the mask she’d been wearing slipped off, and Natasha could feel her feelings materialize on her face. Angst, desperation, panic and anger raged across it in turns, and finally, Natasha bit her lips as quiet, dry sobs began to rack her body. Her knuckles turned white when she clung to the sink even harder. 

She had no idea how and why on Earth she had gotten herself into a situation like this. 

They had had a plan. They had everything under control. 

But now, Clint was sitting in the living room of Avengers tower proudly showing off their daughter to their fellow team members, when really, the girl shouldn’t even be in the building anymore. 

Another wave of anger rippled through Natasha. How could she have agreed to this? What could possibly have possessed her to tell Clint that they could keep the girl? Could she not have asked for time to think about this decision first? She wasn’t cut out to be a mother. She didn’t feel warm and fuzzy whenever she saw the girl. She didn’t feel connected to the child on some deeper level. All she could see when she looked at the little bundle were the pain and suffering that she and Clint would inevitably inflict on this innocent being when one or both of them wouldn’t return from a mission one day, or when one of their countless enemies decided to take out his vengeance on a helpless kid associated with the two of them. 

Natasha dropped her forehead on to the cold sink. There was no going back either. The past 24 hours, Clint had been ecstatic. She had rarely ever seen him this happy. It was clear that he had already lost his heart to the little girl and that the situation was a dream come true for him, as sappy as it sounded. There was no way that Natasha could take that away from him now. Even if he would try his best to understand and accept her decision, he would end up resenting her. And that was something she would never be able to live with. 

It had been true what she’d said the morning before – Clint was and always would be the best thing that happened to her. She simply could not imagine life without him anymore. Clint had seen the worst of her, and the bits he insisted were the best. He had given her a second chance when no-one else would, had trusted her when no-one else dared, and had been there for her through all her nightmares, dream and wake. She drew a deep, shaky breath. Clint was the only thing she’d ever really wanted in life. 

Natasha forced her breathing to become slower and deeper. She could feel that she was at the verge of a panic attack, and as much as she’d allowed herself to feel more in recent years, a panic attack was out of the question. People who panicked made bad decisions; they stopped seeing all the options and didn’t think rationally. And the latter was what she absolutely had to do know. Only that she’d never been in a comparable situation. All she knew was how to fight and infiltrate, not how to take care of a baby and make sure it would grow up into a semi-decent human being. 

Natasha exhaled and raised her upper body back up to pull herself to her full height. She took a small hand towel from the side of the sink, rinsed it under cold water, and pressed it against her flushed face. 

“When in doubt, revert to training.”

As much as Natasha hated the voice of her Tactics trainer in the Red Room, this was one of the best pieces of advice she’d ever gotten. She couldn’t begin to count the number of times this mantra had made her stop, pause, and analyze a dangerous and unfamiliar situation in front of her to figure out a next step that would sometimes even save her life. 

Natasha lowered the towel and fixed herself with an almost hopeful stare in the bathroom mirror. 

“Training.” she whispered. She mentally went through the different types of training she had. This situation obviously didn’t require combative methods, but it was similar to other missions she’d gone on. She would have to build up an entirely new field of expertise and excel in a job related to it, for a very long time. It was just like - 

“Deep cover.” Natasha’s raspy voice was drowned in the noise of the streaming water. Her reflection in the mirror was beginning to disappear behind a layer of steam from the shower. 

That was something she could do. While she maybe hadn’t planned to be a mother in the first place, and even if she didn’t have that innate connection to the child she’d born, she could still act like a mother. She could go on a mission. Objective: Raise a child from infancy. Method: Deep cover as the little girl’s mother. 

Natasha opened her eyes. It wasn’t ideal, of course, but it was the best solution she could think of. Technically, Natasha wouldn’t even be lying to anyone – she wasn’t a heartless monster. Even if she didn’t love the little girl, she of course did want to make sure the girl was fed and cared for, no matter by whom. And Clint, for example, knew that Natasha wasn’t an overly emotional person, so he probably would be more suspicious if he found her cooing over the baby than just reading a book in the same room as her (completely unlike himself – Natasha would be worried if she didn’t find him cooing over the girl regularly, that big softie). 

Natasha braced her arms on her sides. The mirror in front of her was completely fogged by now. It was settled, then. She’d go deep cover as the little girl’s mother and do the best job she could, as always. 

Natasha nodded, and methodically began to finally take off her clothes. Now that she had a plan of action, she felt a lot calmer, and her mind immediately sprang into mission mode as she stepped under the hot stream of the shower. 

The first step of any mission was research. As she squirted some shampoo into her hand, she supposed that in this case, research would mean parenting books and learning about children’s nutritional needs. 

Natasha massaged the shampoo into her hair with determined strokes. 

She was going to make this work. After all, she was the Black Widow.


End file.
